


Alone and afraid

by Aziraphalessushi



Category: Avengers (Marvel Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: After infinity war, Android!Karen, Author Is Sleep Deprived, Gen, Isolation, Soul Stone, Soul world, The Karen in his suit, idk how else to tag her, no beta we die like men, self blame, self doubt, word vomit
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-27
Updated: 2019-11-27
Packaged: 2021-02-26 04:08:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,742
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21587356
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aziraphalessushi/pseuds/Aziraphalessushi
Summary: Karen is a robot.She knows this.Robots don’t feel.So why is she so scared?
Relationships: Karen & Tony Stark, Peter Parker & Karen, Peter Parker & Tony Stark, Tony Stark and his bot children
Comments: 14
Kudos: 61





	Alone and afraid

**Author's Note:**

> I was digging in my notebook and found this, polished it up, and here we are.
> 
> ...yeah um. Enjoy?

Karen was a robot. A simple computer program. She knew this. Not a human. It was something that she had accepted a long time ago. Her purpose was to serve Peter and act as an aid. 

Of course, Karen knew that she would never be able to feel on the same level as anyone, Peter included. He was very empathetic, and she tried to understand, but she was just a program. 

But sitting here, in this hellish dimension, this scared her. 

She wasn’t supposed to be scared. Programs don’t have feelings, unless there was something wrong with them. There was nothing wrong with her. 

Looking around, though, Karen was terrified, programs be damned.

“Ok Karen,” she said to herself. “Think. What would Peter do?” The boy was the only person she had to look up to except Mr. Stark, but based off of FRIDAY’s rants, he wasn’t the best role model. 

Actually, she asked herself what she would tell Peter if he were in the same situation as her. 

“Ok. Step one. Where are you?” Looking through the eyes wasn’t nearly enough, as all she could see through them were orange. Another odd thing-she seemed to be floating on top of some water. The mask was face up, so all she could see was the orange sky. 

Great. “Ok. Step two. Get help.” That one was going to be a bit tricky. She had tried to contact someone from the moment she had landed in this weird world, but couldn’t get through to anyone. Not even the other half of the suit. 

“I can’t connect to FRIDAY. Or Mr. Stark. I can’t go through the comms. I can’t even activate Peter’s damn heater!” Her voice was broken, raw emotion bleeding through the programming. “I’m not supposed to feel anything.” She whispered.

So, she put step two (and her feelings) on hold and moved on. “Step three. What can you remember?” This one would be easier. She had been in Peter’s backpack, or rather the suit was, as her main data was stored in the tower. He had gone out and put her on, and proceeded to fight some aliens before pulling her off and shoving the mask in his pocket while Mr. Stark has given him a ‘new suit’ that he couldn’t be bothered with programming her in. 

She had noticed it when the suit started going crazy. Karen has just shrugged it off as some sort of malfunction, because according to this, both his feet got chopped off. Only, it spread. His upper thighs, his hip. She hadn’t seen much, what with being in a pocket and feeling...almost pain as the malfunction spread to her and...and...

she couldnt see oh god petet take me out i cant stand it it hurts help help im just system error error mask compromised hurts help 70% iiiiii 89% error 99%

Then she had woken up here. 

So, memory was intact. 

Tricky thing, though, was that she couldn’t explain why the suit had been compromised in the first place (much less how she felt it) so she couldn’t glean any information from that. “Keep calm Karen, take big, deep nonexistent breaths.”

Was there a step four? She hadn’t ever felt the need for one. FRIDAY would know. She always seemed to. 

Karen missed her older sister. She missed a lot of things. Peter. Mr. Stark. Vision. New upgrades. Her secret project of her own that no one needed to know about. Every memory drove her wanting to go back. 

She....

She wasn’t sure. Of what, Karen didn’t know. Who? ‘Idk’, as Peter so eloquently texted. 

Bitter sweetness wasn’t a feeling her limited emotion drives could manifest accurately. Yet, she found herself in waves of sad and happy, while she floated in a leaky boat. No matter what she did, it always came back to these feelings. 

Dorky Peter. Her Dad, Tony. Her older brother, Vision, who was really just misunderstood and wanted to fit in (and Karen understood these feelings as well). Her older sister, FRIDAY (she was a bitch about all caps), who was a friend when no one else cared to listen. Peter’s even dorkier friend Ned, who always worked himself to tears over her code. 

Karen missed them all. This emotion was strange and new, and yet felt as though it had been with her for a million years. But she wasn’t supposed to feel emotions. Right? She was a robot. A program. There was nothing wrong with her. No glitches. 

Karen got an awful idea. This orange world was all she could see. There was no access to anything outside of the very limited helmet. She recalled Vision telling her about JARVIS. How it was orange light, that surrounded him until Ultron stabbed him with his blue. He described it as what he imagined purgatory like. He was powerless but still aware.

They hadn’t shut her down, had they? Peter wouldn’t..Mr. Stark...FRI...

They wouldn’t. No, no, no. 

“No!” She cried. They liked her, right? She was young, sure, but that meant room to grow, and learn, and-

Had they found out her project? She had been so careful! The other Avengers had been fine with it when Vision did it, so would they shut her down over it? She just wanted.....

God, what was she even supposed to get from her project? She was a program. A robot. She just wanted a physical form so badly, just wanted to be normal. Just wanted to be looked upon as an equal, not just another AI. 

But they wouldn’t shut her down over that, right? Vision got it. He had the stone, yeah, but she deserved it too! A feeling of normalcy, of belonging and fitting in.

God, there really was something wrong with her, wasn’t there? She can’t feel. Robot. Program. Keep it straight. Remember what FRIDAY says. File folders. File folders.

Karen screamed. 

“Fuck the file folders! Fuck everyone! I just WANTED TO BE normal. Just normal.” Tears threatened to spill out of-well, she didn’t have tear ducts or any of the necessary things to cry. Great. Another reminder of how messed up she is. So full of glitches.

No wonder they shut her down.

Karen felt a pull. The masks view stayed the same, although that might be due to the constant orange setting. 

She squeezed her eyes shut, hoping it wasn’t like last time she had felt the pull. 

It was only just the once, and when Karen opened her eyes again.....

Was that the mask? 

She reached out to grab it, and gasped as a hand came into view. 

It moved with her. Was it...was it her?

She clenched the hand, and she felt pain. Actual pain. No amount of empathizing let her feel pain.

Something wet dripped down her chin, sending cold shivers up her spine. She wiped at her eyes, and could feel tears. Actual, real life tears!

But how had she gotten tears? How could she feel the pain?

A voice answered her questions, although she was sure they were not spoken aloud.

“I have granted you with what you seek the most. Use this gift wisely.” 

“Who see you? What if your name? Why me? Thank you!” She shouted various other things to try and evoke a response, but the voice was silent to where she would have believed it to be a hallucination if not for her new body. 

She clutched the mask and shook up shakily. Examining her body, she found a white lace shirt with jean shorts. Her skin was a tanned, and although in a bun, she could tell that her hair was a mix of red and blue. 

It looked almost exactly like her project, right down to the hair she had designed for Peter. Upon extreme examination, she could see that even her plans for USB ports in the fingers and a weapon in her wrist (again inspired be Peter) were there. It was her plans, and this was her perfect body. 

Karen was so happy. She was elated. Overjoyed. Exuberant. She was...

Scared.

Who was that voice? Why had it given that to her? Was it Tony, feeling sorry about her shut down? Peter? She hadn’t finished building it yet, as she didn’t want to raise suspicion on missing materials. 

So many questions, so little answers. 

“Step one. Where are you?” She was still in this world of orange, alone. Looking around, she could see that the room either reflected the orange, or it was endless. The floor was about an inch deep, but she floated on top like some sort of ice. It reminded Karen on oobleck, which Peter had been obsessed with. 

“Step two. Get help.” She still couldn’t connect to anything, not even the tower even though she should have been able to since her conscious was there. 

“Step three.” No new memories that she knew of. 

Still no step four. 

She closed her eyes eyes, shocked at how the dark the world became. Breathing she couldn’t do, having not finished those plans yet. Still, however, she sat down and closed her eyes. She sat in silence for hours, keeping count with a timer inside of her head. 

It was amazing her. 

Even though her eyes were closed, it wasn’t pure darkness, almost like how when the suits eyes closed, she still saw Peter’s situation. 

Speaking of the suit, she grabbed the mask and put it on, temporarily constricted by her bun that she then let loose. 

It was strange, being on the other side. She was now able to control the eyes and marveled at how they were how well they synced. 

Of course, she was still controlling the masks functions, and turned her focus onto it. It gave her extreme vertigo, like splitting her head in half. So much so that she snapped out of it quickly.

She would have to ask Friday how she did it when she was back home. But wait, she thought. Aren’t I disconnected? So she would never be getting home. This was her new home. Suck it up, Karen. 

Tears slid down her face once more. Suddenly, she heard the voice speak once more blah but she had already gotten a body, right? What is The Voice going to plug her back in? 

When are familiar person came tumbling into the fog, however, she knew the voice wasn’t talking to her.

**Author's Note:**

> Lol what a ride. One shot rn unless you want a second part?


End file.
